Jet Powered Blitz Dragster???

[Keith Webb]

It's owned and built by Ron Laycock and started life as a F15.

Ron rescued it from the tip and initially rebuilt it as his daily driver, fitting a Holden front suspension and engine.

Later it was further modified to take a Rolls-Royce Viper engine from a Macchi trainer. Ron engineered his own afterburner and brought the contraption to Corowa in 2008 as Howard said.

It was quite a sensation, with one late night fire-up near the caravan park attracting the police - after all it was a total fire ban day.

He did a run down the Corowa airport runway, noisy and spectacular. Ron commented it gets very light in the front end once the afterburner kicks in and once the power is off is almost uncontrollable.

Ron also had a motorcycle with the same engine, leading an aviation friend to comment he wouldn't like to have a time expired jet engine with a home made afterburner between his legs.

There is a full interview and footage of the runs on my DVD "Year of the Tracked Vehicle" which you can order by sending me a PM. I have PAL and NTSC versions.